


Afterimages

by thebasement_archivist



Category: Highlander - All Media Types, The X-Files
Genre: Crossover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2000-08-15
Updated: 2000-08-15
Packaged: 2018-11-20 18:28:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11340945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebasement_archivist/pseuds/thebasement_archivist
Summary: Disaster visits Walter Skinner's personal life, and coping with it leaves him floundering. Duncan MacLeod never asked to be involved, but fate intervenes. Together, they come face to face with some painful issues as their lives intersect between prevarication and grief, need and revelation, and both men must find new ways of thinking in the midst of change.





	Afterimages

**Author's Note:**

> Note from alice ttlg, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Basement](http://fanlore.org/wiki/The_Basement), which moved to the AO3 to ensure the stories are always available and so that authors may have complete control of their own works. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in June 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Basement's collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/thebasement/profile).

 

Afterimages by rac

Title: Afterimages  
Author: rac <>

Category: Highlander/XFiles slash xover  
Rating: NC-17 for a little horizontal mambo of the male/male variety. Please heed the warning!  
Disclaimer: None of the characters of Highlander or The X-Files are owned by me, more's the pity. They and all their profits are owned by Panzer/Davis Productions, and Chris Carter & 1013 Productions, respectively.  
Archiving: available at author's website: <http://enook.net/hl/rac/rac.htm> Basement and other list "automatic" archives, yes. Others, please ask.  
Originally printed in the zine, "Wounded Heroes: Tales of the Big Guys". For more stories from the zine, check out the links at Wounded Heroes' webpage: <http://enook.net/woundedheroes.htm>  
Summary: Disaster visits Walter Skinner's personal life, and coping with it leaves him floundering. Duncan MacLeod never asked to be involved, but fate intervenes. Together, they come face to face with some painful issues as their lives intersect between prevarication and grief, need and revelation, and both men must find new ways of thinking in the midst of change.  
Please do write with any feedback <>. I'm always interested in reader's reactions to stories, especially this one. It was an unusual one, and an unusually hard one, to write. I'm still not sure if I hit the mark!

* * *

*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^

Afterimages  
by rac

Some say that happiness is not good for mortals, and they ought to be answered that sorrow is not fit for immortals and is utterly useless to any one. -William Blake-

Seacouver General Hospital  
September, 1999

"What?" Scully's voice cracked down the sterile, white hallway like a gunshot in the stillness. "What do you mean, you've lost the body?"

The morgue doctor murmured something to her, and Scully exploded. "I don't care how many people you have out with the flu, I want an immediate search."

More murmurs.

"Then do it again. Call all the morticians who have picked up bodies in the last twelve hours. Call the police! But don't just stand there and tell Assistant Director Skinner and me you've lost the body!"

The hapless pathologist scurried away, his face as bloodless as those who lay behind the morgue door, covered in white sheets. Scully's eyes flashed like blue fire, hot and sharp, in the harsh fluorescent lights. Dark circles painted grief beneath her ire. "Sir, I-I'm sorry..." she trailed off. Horror and compassion dimmed the blue fire to a softer hue.

Skinner cut her off, his voice harsh. "It's not your fault, Agent."

"No, sir, but..." Her hand hovered a moment near his arm, and Skinner's muscles pulled tight. The hand fell back down, comfort aborted. Scully straightened up. "Let me make sure Dr. Wilkins is doing everything possible to find their error."

Find the error.

The *error*.

Scully marched down the hall after the doctor, her footsteps tapping then fading through an office door.

Skinner stood unmoving in the corridor, surrounded by a silence filled with death. The sharp, pungent odor of formaldehyde overlaid the metallic tang of spilled blood, their strength belying the pristine spotlessness of the white walls and floor tiles.

Skinner breathed in death and nearly gagged.

First the phone call in Washington, and now to fly out and find this. Find nothing.

He had been through loss before. He'd handled shock, pain, and grief. He'd dealt with death before. It should feel familiar. He should be able to fall back on the way he'd handled it in the past.

But it wasn't working. He had no objectivity here, nothing to lock on to.

Raised voices echoed back into the corridor, accusations and anger answered by meaningless pabulum. He wanted to yell through the hospital that Mulder was no one's *error*.

Rage flooded through Skinner's limbs, overwhelming the grief and frustration. He wheeled away, his black leather shoes making no sound on the spotless tiles.

From the polished steel of the elevator doors, his own reflection stalked toward him, silent, looming...menacing. His overcoat flapped like large wings against his legs. Dark eyes burned in a frozen, granite face. He looked like some grimacing gargoyle. Like an avenging angel swooping down on the unsuspecting.

The steel doors parted, erasing the picture they had captured, and chatting staff members discreetly moved back to await the next car, leaving him alone in the darkened elevator. Alone with a rage that ebbed as suddenly as it had flamed up, eaten away by a memory.

An avenging angel, a guardian angel. A beacon in the night, Mulder had called him. He'd teased him about his usual tendency to swoop in to the rescue, black wings flying. But if Mulder could see him now, he'd call him an angel from hell.

As he stood alone in the hushed, steel cage, strange and uncharted territory loomed before Skinner. No rescue here, no way to save the day. A thousand beacons could not right this swamped boat.

The loss choked him, smothering him with emotions unlike any he'd felt before. He gasped for breath, clawing at his collar, yanking it open in his haste to get some air. But there was no relief.

The doors opened onto the lobby, and Skinner stumbled off in his haste to get outside. He rushed through the electric glass doors at the entrance and stood gulping down the cooler, fresh air.

Mulder was dead. He was dead. And now he was an error, his body lost amid a bureaucratic screw-up.

An anchor line ripped free, tearing his flesh as it pulled loose. He hadn't even been aware it was there, keeping him warm and safe and afloat, until it was gone, leaving him adrift in a vast, violent, black sea of grief, drowning without hope that anything could save him.

January, 2000

This time, he didn't tell anyone where he was going. He simply submitted a leave statement to the Director, made his reservations and slipped away.

The last time he had headed out west, he'd shared the futility of the trip with Dana Scully. The futility and the grief.

The look in her eyes during that trip had haunted him: stark, grief-filled and compassionate. He had barely been able to look at them. Each time she had tried to initiate a more personal conversation, he couldn't deal with it, couldn't face her grief along with his own. He had talked to Scully about the facts, retraced the Seacouver Police Department's steps with her, and finally, speculated out loud about a shadow conspiracy and the shadow men who had tried to stop her and Mulder many times before.

Maybe this time, they'd succeeded.

But he had not been able to discuss his personal loss with her. He couldn't. It was too much to speak of out loud. To talk about Mulder with her. About Mulder's death.

Her partner. His lover.

It had been four months since Mulder had made that fateful trip out west. He'd been so excited about the case, another of the beheading murders that cropped up frequently not only in domestic police files, but in INTERPOL files from around the world. Typical Mulder, so sure he'd found a connection.

Skinner knew he had found one. And damn his John Wayne tendency to move in without backup.

For the first time, Skinner had purposely gone unarmed to a meeting with that nameless smoking bastard, too afraid he'd pull the trigger regardless of what was said. He hadn't thought so at the time, but now Skinner wondered if the bastard had actually been telling the truth when he'd denied ordering Mulder's death and his body's disappearance.

Which left Skinner with nothing to go on, nowhere to turn. Plots within plots, conspiracies within conspiracies...it was all too vast for him to have an inkling of where to continue looking. And Skinner's personal government contacts, while sympathetic, weren't too concerned about the loss of an undeniably annoying federal agent. His avenues dried up, one by one.

Despite the blackness that had seized him the first few months, Skinner couldn't let it go. Six years of his professional life were tied up with Mulder. Much more to the point, so were three years of his personal life. Three infuriating, incredible years out of his half century; he'd hoped for many more.

Eventually, everybody died on him; the lesson life had taught him was stark and hard to miss. With each new loss, Skinner felt a piece of himself freeze up, become unusable, cold and hard, until it seemed, like now, that he was not much more than habits and routine and left-over momentum. He wondered what would happen when that momentum ran out.

For the moment, though, Skinner let illogic hold sway and let his momentum carry him relentlessly back to Seacouver. Collecting his luggage and renting a car took no thought; he walked through the Seacouver airport on auto-pilot. Retracing his steps of months ago, he checked into a hotel and contacted the detectives in charge of the case. If they wondered what an Assistant Director of the FBI was doing checking up on a dead-end case in person, a case the local FBI field office had been in charge of, neither mentioned it. They were polite, patient and offered him no new information.

Even Skinner didn't know why he was back, except that nothing was settled, least of all, himself. He had let the other agents and detectives handle things months ago; he had been in no condition to take a very active role at the time. But the large hole Mulder's death left in his life still gaped and bled like an unhealed wound. The memorial service Mulder's mother had arranged hardly sufficed as closure. When he'd heard from the Seattle office that the Seacouver police were downgrading the case to the cold files-drawers of unsolved cases-something snapped.

Skinner needed to do something to help put his aching grief to rest. He needed answers.

Against all rational argument, his need drove him once more to the scene of the crime. Like the faithful haunting a shrine, he returned again, looking for a miracle.

*^*^*^*

Duncan MacLeod rocked back in his chair in the dojo office, letting the squeak of old springs fill the silence. In his hand, a pen traveled around and around, point up, then down, each time making a mark on the paper calendar blotter Richie had bought years ago in his efforts to try and become better organized at running the place. Like many other things, it had stayed. MacLeod hadn't been able to throw anything away that had been Richie's. Not yet.

It was a typical Saturday at DeSalvo's, all the usual customers in for their weekend routine. A burst of masculine laughter filtered into the office, snapping MacLeod's focus back to the man across the desk.

His tall, broad-shouldered body shimmered subtly with suppressed emotions concealed behind bland glasses and shuttered brown eyes. A tight face matched his body, hard and set in stern lines. He appeared to be a strong-willed and driven man, and MacLeod found it hard to relax in the presence of such barely leashed power. His body reacted to it, tensing with anticipation.

Taking a deep breath, MacLeod realized he had cooked his own goose months ago when he'd become involved with a shooting investigation. Way too late now. He sighed, wondering about the vagaries of fate. Skinner was a savvy investigator. No doubt, personal needs had brought him back here long after the police and local FBI had put the investigation on a back burner. The last thing he wanted was to wave a red flag in the FBI Assistant Director's face. Anonymity, difficult enough these days in the wake of computer records, was damned hard to accomplish with the bright, searing eye of the government peering at you.

On the other hand...there might be a way to distract him away from zeroing in on things MacLeod would rather not have investigated too closely. Obviously, Walter Skinner was finding it hard to put the past behind him. MacLeod was going to help him.

Sighing, MacLeod tried to look believably awkward as he answered Skinner's query, not too far a stretch from how he truly felt. "Yes, I do have something to add...I didn't tell the police everything."

Skinner's lips firmed and light flared in the dark, staring eyes, hard to read behind his glasses. The force of will Skinner exuded brushed electric and hot against MacLeod's skin as the bigger man leaned into his space. "Mr. MacLeod, what exactly did you find necessary to keep from the Seacouver Police in their ongoing investigation?"

MacLeod stood up, throwing the pen down. He didn't want to do this here. "Can we take this somewhere we can talk more comfortably?"

"Mr. MacLeod, if you're worried about being charged with hindering a police investigation, it's a little late-"

"No, it's not that, it's just...It's a little awkward, a lot personal." He saw Skinner's eyebrows go up skeptically, and added, "Awkward for me. Personal for you."

Realization of what MacLeod was intimating flooded into Skinner's eyes. MacLeod shrugged his jacket on, watching the play of emotions over the other man's face. Frustration, grief, and anger passed by lightening-quick, followed by a blank mask of cooperation.

"Very well, if you insist," Skinner conceded gruffly, averting his eyes now.

As they trudged out of the dojo, MacLeod debated the efficacy of walking to Joe's, but discarded that idea. Most likely, Assistant Director Skinner would feel more comfortable with his own vehicle and an easy get-away at close hand. They split up into their cars for the short drive to Joe's Place.

Skinner frowned as they entered the bar. Uncomfortable with the role in which he'd cast himself, MacLeod gestured the taller man into a private booth in the corner. "Can I get you a beer?"

A deeper scowl firmed Skinner's hard face. "Look, Mr. MacLeod, if you've got something to add to your statement, I'd prefer we conclude this as quickly as possible so that the investigation can move ahead."

I know I'm going to need a beer now. "I'll keep that in mind. I'll be right back."

Behind the bar, Joe watched him make his way through the tables. "Mac. How are ya?"

MacLeod nodded at the glass Joe held up. "Two, Joe. Fine, thanks. I think."

The grizzled Watcher gestured with his chin to the distant booth. "Who the hell is that? I don't recognize the face."

MacLeod stopped, realized what Joe was thinking, and turned to eye the man waiting impatiently for him. The irony struck him suddenly. Skinner's height added an inch or two onto MacLeod's own six feet, and his muscled arms, neck and chest spoke of a weight regimen. His face had a lean, comfortable, earthy look that screamed fighter, with a thick nose that had been broken sometime in the past. The bald head added to his don't-fuck-with-me image. His large hands were callused with strong fingers; his long legs, lean and muscled. Dressed in a beautifully tailored suit, pristine white shirt and tie, his long black overcoat flowing over wide shoulders, no wonder Joe immediately thought "Immortal". He'd probably make a great Immortal. Strong, tough, focused. Much more the warrior at heart than a bureaucrat in pricey suits.

"You wouldn't, no reason to. He's not Immortal."

Joe shoved two glasses of beer across the bar. "Then..." He stopped, wanting to pry but realizing belatedly that maybe it wasn't any of his business.

"I'll fill you in later. Let me get back there before this explodes in my face."

Joe shrugged and nodded, and MacLeod walked back to the booth, contemplating the best approach to accomplish what he had to do. He needed to make this work, or a long and annoying disappearing act might loom in the immediate future.

The glasses made hollow thuds on the table as MacLeod slid into the booth opposite Skinner. Before the other man could open his mouth to complain again, MacLeod held up a hand. "Hear me out, please, before you accuse me of something. I was the one to find your agent. He'd fallen to the ground, twisted between his car and the next. I'd heard the shot; otherwise, I'd never have gone looking. The parking garage attendant called 911. It took them quite a few minutes to get there, and I waited with him."

"Mulder," Skinner murmured. At MacLeod's blank look, he explained, "His name was Mulder."

"Mulder," MacLeod repeated softly and nodded. "Before they arrived, Mulder gave me a few private messages to relay. One of them was to someone named Scully, the other to a Walter."

Skinner's expression didn't change, but his face went pale and tight. Abruptly, he picked up the glass and took a long swallow, setting it down without a sound. "You didn't mention this to the police before."

"No, no I didn't. They were private messages and didn't seem pertinent to their investigation."

Skinner's tenuous composure started to fray around the edges. "So you withheld information just because it seemed private? For all that you knew, it could have been very important, something connected to whatever Mulder was working on."

"I-"

"And why the hell didn't you contact us if you had messages for us?"

MacLeod stared at the wild thing lurking in Skinner's brown eyes. They weren't so shuttered anymore. "Because, Mr. Skinner, how in the hell did I know who 'Scully' and 'Walter' were? For all I knew, they could've been the ravings of a delirious mind. He was pretty much out of it, he'd lost a lot of blood," MacLeod added quietly.

Skinner took a deep breath, then another swallow of his beer, and worked to get himself back under control. "What was the message?" he asked tightly.

MacLeod spoke evenly, "He said, 'tell him I said not to do something incredibly stupid if I don't make it'. And to 'stay away from the smoker or I'll come back and haunt him'."

MacLeod paused, uncomfortable as he watched Skinner's facial expressions change. He'd never doubted his own code of Immortal rules. The rules he demanded new Immortals adhere to had a purpose; they had deadly, legitimate reasons for existing. Severing all ties with mortals was only logical and healthiest for all involved. But reminding himself of that fact didn't make looking up into those now-naked brown eyes any easier.

"Right before the EMTs arrived, he said to tell Walter he loved him, that the past couple of years were some of the best of his life-" MacLeod broke off at the faint sound Skinner made as he closed his eyes, a pained grimace on his face.

Skinner shook his head once, as if to say he couldn't do this, couldn't hear this, and the next moment, he lurched up, moving away from the booth, accidentally knocking over a chair as he fled to the door.

Dammit. Joe looked at Skinner, then back at MacLeod, unspoken questions on his face. MacLeod swigged the rest of his beer, slid back into his jacket and waved them away with a quickly mumbled 'later' to Joe as he followed Skinner out of the bar into the winter afternoon's fading twilight. He stopped, surprised to see Skinner's rental still parked right next to MacLeod's car in the lot. A quick scan showed the tall man striding at a fast pace down the street, away from the bar. Back toward the dojo.

What he'd like to do, MacLeod thought, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets and standing there watching the man's retreating back, was simply go back in the bar and have a nice chat with Joe. Forget all about the FBI and annoying, dead agents and grief-filled lovers.

That's what he'd like to do.

But that wasn't what he was going to do.

MacLeod briefly contemplated taking his car, then pocketed the keys and jogged off after the other man.

*^*^*^*^*^*

Reality fractured around Skinner as he jogged down the sidewalk. He needed to get away from the god-awful tightness in his chest, away from the fire burning through his stomach. Away from those words coming relentlessly from MacLeod's mouth, his compassionate brown eyes looking so damn knowingly at him, as if he understood what it was like, as if he really knew--

Skinner breathed deeply as his long legs ate up the sidewalk. He concentrated on keeping himself together while the past four months dissolved as if they'd never happened and the feelings hit him again, as raw and fresh as the day he'd first felt them.

He breathed, focusing on the cracks in the sidewalk. He would stay cohesive. Coherent. Sanity was a valuable asset he needed to retain; he held on to his with rigid fingers.

Skinner passed no one on the street as the sodium vapor lights flashed on dim strength, then grew in intensity in the dying light. He had no idea where he was and couldn't rustle up much concern for not knowing when a hand fell on his shoulder. Before his mind could engage, his body reacted.

He pivoted and swung down low, his fist connecting hard with soft body tissue. His attacker expelled a loud oomph even as Skinner readied himself for another swing, this time with more damage in mind. But somehow, things changed. Suddenly neither he nor his attacker were where they had been a second ago, and Skinner blinked as a dirty, rough, brick wall filled his vision. His knees screamed from the gravel that ground into them where he'd been shoved down. His wrists were twisted back and high, the pain making him grimace as a knee wedged into his kidneys and a boot toe nudged him in the back of his knee.

"Mr. Skinner, it's Duncan MacLeod. I'll let you go, but I'm not really in the mood for getting my ass kicked this evening. Just let me know you understand and aren't going to try to pound me into the sidewalk again." MacLeod's uniquely accented voice was close to his ear.

He took a shaky breath and nodded. Immediately, the restrictions on his body loosened, but he stayed on his knees against the wall, not sure of his legs.

"Here."

Skinner turned his head and saw MacLeod with his hand outstretched. He nodded, shifting his weight, swallowing down the burning bubble of embarrassment and humiliation that threatened to overwhelm him. "Thanks." Amazingly enough, his glasses had stayed on, only getting knocked askew in the tussle. He straightened them, feeling awkward and horribly gauche. His mouth opened, but nothing emerged. A damned Assistant Director of the FBI, and he couldn't even find two words to put together.

The other man stood there, a calm force in the midst of Skinner's turbulence.

"Listen, we're about two blocks from my place. Walk there with me? I've got an apartment upstairs from the dojo. The whisky's oak-aged, 18 years old, and the price is right."

Thank God, at least somebody knew what to say, Skinner thought, and nodded. "Thanks." Maybe some of that whisky rushing through his veins would help take some of the sharp edges off everything. Dull his embarrassment to a soft pink glow and mute his pain to tolerable levels.

The prospect of a drink was good; even better, MacLeod knew when not to speak. They walked in silence, moving from one island of light to the next: light, dark, light, dark, dark. One street lamp out. One light that had reached the end of its life expectancy.

One *dead* light.

On leaden legs, he followed MacLeod up the front stairs to the dojo, past people still working out and onto an old freight-style elevator. MacLeod keyed the panel on the wall and set the car in motion, a noisy, gear-grinding ride to the top floor which allowed continued silence. The car jolted to a halt, and MacLeod pulled the gates open and walked off.

Skinner followed, feeling split in two as if watching his own actions from a distance. Two steps into the room, he stopped.

MacLeod moved around, taking his coat off, getting glasses. Skinner watched him for a minute, then took in the loft. At another time, Skinner would have detailed everything. Now, though, he couldn't absorb the details through the odd, cottony feeling surrounding him, receiving only a general impression of space. A large, open space. And warmth. Even though the weather outside was chilly, it was warm and comfortable in here.

"Take your coat off, have a seat." MacLeod's voice arrowed through the haze that buzzed in Skinner's head. He saw MacLeod place a glass filled with amber liquid on the table in front of the soft, leather sofa, and he shed his overcoat, holding it for a second until his host took it from him.

"I'll hang it up. Please, sit down."

"Thanks." He sat, and took a large swallow of the mellow whisky. Smooth, it was smooth. It really was the good stuff. Expensive. The kind that slid down so easily you never even knew how much you'd had until it was far too late. "I owe you an apology." To his own ears, his voice sounded raw and vulnerable.

MacLeod had a glass in his hand and drank also, standing off to one side. "Apology accepted."

MacLeod gave a small shrug when Skinner showed surprise at his easy response. "You had an excuse. Have you eaten today?" MacLeod changed the subject idly, as if simply curious.

"Breakfast." He had eaten at the hotel before leaving for the police department. MacLeod wandered into the kitchen and began opening the refrigerator and cabinet doors.

"It's long past lunch now, nearly dinnertime." MacLeod looked like a man at home in the kitchen as he began assembling ingredients and utensils.

"It's not necessary-"

"Do you have anywhere else you need to be?" MacLeod cut Skinner off.

He shook his head, feeling a strange lightening inside. "I-no."

"Then sit back, relax. Let me fix us some dinner before we drink too much whisky on empty stomachs." MacLeod looked at Skinner briefly before giving his attention back to the food. "I owe you an apology, also. I'm sorry I didn't pursue finding out who you were before, and that the message was so late and so unexpected."

What could Skinner say to that? It had hit him like a ton of bricks. He had fooled himself into thinking he was coping well, dealing with it. But let one unanticipated finger of fate scrape against his wound, and it opened up again, hurting like it was brand new. Gut shot-it felt like the time he'd been gut shot. This time, though, the pain was higher up, in the middle of his chest, and he wasn't spilling red blood all over the floor, his life weakening with each heartbeat.

It only felt like he was.

His hands caught the light, and the flash from his ring made him look down. The platinum band gleamed softly with an odd, warm, silver glow, a thick, wide band of outrageously expensive metal. When Mulder had given it to him Christmas a year ago, Skinner had been literally speechless. Mulder made some smart-ass joke, and the moment of intense emotion turned into something more tolerable. He told Skinner that he had to mark him in some fashion to stop the damn secretaries and office support staff from practically kidnapping him out from under Mulder's nose.

Skinner could only blink at him in surprise, and Mulder hooted, declaring that only Walt would have the women panting in the halls as he walked by and not notice it. For that matter, Mulder told him there were men who looked, also, as Walt walked by, his body displayed to perfection in form-fitting suit pants that draped so nicely, his chest highlighted in the starched and fitted white shirts he had by the truckload. This way everybody knew that Walt was taken, Mulder asserted, even if they didn't know by whom.

Marked and taken. Skinner had done a little marking and taking of his own, with the new ring and its inscription, "You abducted me, F.", the only thing either had worn at the time.

He hadn't managed to purchase a ring for Mulder in all the months after the holidays, and the grief at that omission sat upon him with a tangible, weighty regret. He'd been too busy. He had always been too busy.

"I hope you like stir-fry."

The images from Skinner's memories shattered into a thousand pieces at MacLeod's voice. He blinked, seeing once more the whisky in his hands. An errant breath of air caressed his face, chilling moisture on his skin, and Skinner felt stupid and mawkish to be caught sniveling over his drink. A surreptitious swipe was covered up by resettling his glasses and rubbing his forehead and the bridge of his nose.

Skinner regarded his unexpected host, and part of him acknowledged just how bizarre his current situation was. Unprecedented.

Well, hadn't it all been rather unprecedented? Waking up one morning and finding himself happy, in an intimate relationship with one of his own agents. An agent so far outside the bureau norm he frequently walked on the other side of reality.

Now, he was a guest of someone he'd come to question, hoping to ferret out some morsel of information or truth that the witness had left out or forgotten in the police report. Instead he'd lost control twice, no, three times now. God knows what kind of impression he was giving this sedate stranger, who stood cooking in his kitchen as if nothing rattled him and he entertained precariously balanced federal agents every day.

Skinner had to clear his throat of the knots that had risen up from his stomach before speaking. "You don't have to feed me. I'm already lowering your whisky supply." The words came out sounding gruff. Well, he felt raw. And still ashamed that he'd been unable to control himself, even though his lucid self understood why.

MacLeod stood steady, looking over at Skinner as he stirred something on the stove. "Mr. Skinner--"

"Walter, please." What the hell. He was drinking and going nowhere soon. Screw formalities.

"Walter, then. Call me Duncan. Or Mac, like most of my friends. As for dinner," MacLeod did some things on the stove, then looked back at Skinner. "You're an invited guest in my home. Of course you'll stay for dinner." MacLeod flashed him the first smile Skinner remembered seeing on his handsome face. He had beautiful, expressive eyes, a lush mouth, and moved with a grace that spoke of his physical prowess. He was a striking, self-confident man.

This man, this compelling stranger, was now his last link to the thing most precious to him; a voice from beyond the grave, charged with the weighty task of delivering a dying man's last words. Intimate words, spoken only between the two men involved, and even then, seldom. Words now exposed to the light of day and the scrutiny of this stranger; words that had flayed Skinner open wide, leaving him gasping for breath as they'd whipped at him, making him face more realistically than anything else that the man he thought of as his life partner was dead, dead, *dead*, and never coming home again.

Skinner took a deep breath, working hard to maintain his composure.

He wanted to leave immediately, hide his re-exposed grief, yet he found himself settling deeper into MacLeod's sofa, laying his head back as if at home. He couldn't walk away from this tenuous link to Mulder, this young man who had first wounded him with his words and was now offering him respite from his pain.

Occasionally and with fond exasperation, Skinner had told Mulder that one day the younger man was going to cause Skinner to lose his mind. Mulder had laughed and said, "Where the heart has gone, the mind is sure to follow."

Skinner supposed it now meant, as far as his sanity was concerned, it was only a matter of time.

*^*^*^*^*^*^*

MacLeod puttered quietly in the kitchen, performing routine tasks automatically while his mind focused on the problem sitting on his couch. So far, his words had deflected Skinner's renewed interest in the criminal investigation of Mulder's death and disappearance. But they'd been just as effective in stirring up the man's grief, and MacLeod couldn't ignore it.

This residual of Fate's intervention in Mac's life was his problem now. Mulder's ex-boss and mortal lover, a very important man in the FBI, sat settling into his couch with no indication he planned on leaving soon, despite his obvious unease. His struggle crackled with electric force, reaching across the room to MacLeod. Having his personal life discussed openly by a complete stranger hadn't sat easily with Skinner. Mac had to admire the fact he was still here. His quiet dignity and strength were strained but still intact.

Good; Mac certainly wasn't out to harm the man. Just...set him on a new path, in a new direction away from his past. Away from the lover who could no longer be a part of his life. Fate had intervened in all of their lives; it was only left for them to walk the path in front of them.

MacLeod grabbed the cutting board and vigorously scraped vegetable leavings into the trash along with his restless thoughts. All that mattered in the long run was everybody staying alive; in the end, that was what it was all about, as Mulder was learning.

He dumped the cut-up vegetables into the wok and smiled grimly while the oil spat and hissed like a live, deadly creature. //I told the old man I'd finally learned: survival is more important than any abstract ideal.//Without survival, there weren't a hell of a lot of other choices.

A month ago, MacLeod had nearly allowed O'Roarke to take his life, and with it, all of his choices. Yes, he'd learned. Survival was paramount and keeping your loved ones safe was part of that process.

MacLeod hadn't kept Richie safe. Or Tessa, or Little Deer, or Charlie, or Fitz. So many lost...

Frowning, Mac drained his glass. After ladling out the crisp stir-fry, he turned off the flame under the wok while the rice finished steaming. Without a word, he picked up Skinner's glass and refilled both his and Skinner's, handing it back just as silently.

In his four hundred years, he'd become very familiar with loss. Mac might have said he knew it intimately, knew both the rough and the tender caresses it bestowed, knew the many shadings and afterimages of its passing. Or the continuing shadow of its staying. He had traveled far and wide, and after all these years, had finally accepted loss in his life like a lover, its presence an intimate given.

Yet watching this man's grief unsettled Mac. He was the one who normally exited from the lives of those around him. Playing the role of sympathetic support to a mortal lover's grief, a grief he had a personal part in creating, strained his objectivity. Guilt, unwanted and unneeded, pushed its way past his resolve. Empathy tugged at him. He fidgeted with his glass, perched on the edge of his desk and obliquely watched Walter Skinner.

An aura of unrelieved anger and grief hung around him like a cloud, dark and heavy. Compared to the sharp, focused man who had walked into his dojo this afternoon, Skinner now seemed lost. Mac needed to do something, to help alleviate Skinner's pain.

"Here." MacLeod yanked open his armoire and pulled out a set of sweats, dumping them without ceremony in Skinner's lap. "Why don't we pick up where we left off earlier up the street. It's after six, I'll just close the dojo a little early tonight. We'll have the place to ourselves." He gave a wolfish smile. "It'll help work up an appetite."

The piercing gaze that met his belied its owner's tired slump. They locked eyes for a moment as Skinner considered, then he stood, navy sweats crushed in his fist. "Where can I change?"

"There. Help yourself." Mac pointed toward the bathroom. He watched as Skinner skimmed out of his suit coat on the way across the room and tossed it carelessly upon MacLeod's bed before closing the bathroom door.

MacLeod wondered what in the hell he was doing and moved to rummage around once more for sweats for himself.

*^*^*^*^*^*

The last of the hangers-on in the dojo finally left, and MacLeod locked the doors early. Both men moved smoothly into their warm-ups, each in their own style. Skinner did chin-ups on the bar and floor stretches while Mac moved gracefully through an abbreviated version of an empty- hand kata. Ten minutes later, they faced each other, silently inquiring.

Skinner spoke up first. "I'm no martial artist. If you're wanting an even match, sorry. Can't give you one there."

MacLeod pictured a rock, firm and unyielding in its position. This man knew himself and his limits intimately, and MacLeod respected that. "How about boxing? You have the look of a man who's worn the gloves."

Skinner nodded in agreement and MacLeod extracted gloves and head gear from the equipment lock-up.

"It's the nose, isn't it."

MacLeod glanced sharply at Skinner as he strapped on the head protector, then realized the other man was being humorous despite his otherwise deadpan delivery.

"It's got fighter all over it," MacLeod agreed. "Broke it boxing?"

That pulled a rusty laugh from Skinner. "Not exactly. I was in the Marines, 'Nam. There was...a disagreement. I backed up the underdog. Unfortunately, the other asshole had his whole platoon with him." Skinner shrugged. "Live and learn."

Something in his expression made MacLeod smile. "Did he?"

Skinner looked up, surprised, and caught Mac's expression. He relaxed, and gave MacLeod a look that left no doubt why this man had risen to the top of the bureaucratic heap in his field. "Yeah, he did. Later, a long way away from his buddies." He pulled on his gloves, yanking the ties with his teeth. "No one ever tried that again," he added with a mild, wistful expression that told MacLeod more about him than any words could.

It had been a while since Mac had put on the gloves, but his graceful form stood him in good stead. Dancing over the scarred and polished wooden boards, he moved cautiously at first, but he quickly picked up speed as he acquainted himself with Skinner's style. The floorboards creaked under his feet; his gloves thudded against Skinner's.

Sweat darkened Skinner's clothes and glistened on his neck. MacLeod watched his opponent pour more and more energy into the fight and gauged his own hits accordingly. He let Skinner become the aggressor, let Skinner rain down blow after blow on his chest and shoulders, a perfect purging of emotion. Better here, with Mac--after all, it wasn't exactly as if Skinner could do any permanent damage to him.

He made a few good hits himself, connecting just hard enough to have Skinner backing away, shaking his head to clear it, before MacLeod allowed the coup de grace. Skinner feinted with his left, a straight, glancing punch to the temple, following immediately with a strong right uppercut that MacLeod didn't quite manage to block. His teeth slammed together with enough force to cut something in pieces. As his head snapped back and he staggered into a weight bench, he thought it was a damn good thing his tongue hadn't been in the way; he wasn't at all sure Immortal healing extended to rejuvenating bitten-off body parts. The lights seemed to dim, and he slithered to the floor on his butt.

"Dammit--" Skinner's angry curse penetrated the haze. "You okay?" Gentle hands fumbled with Mac's head gear and pulled it off.

The ringing in his head faded and MacLeod blinked his eyes open. "Ow." Something scraped inside as he wriggled his jaw back and forth, a sharp pain he rubbed away with the edge of his glove while waiting for the healing to kick in. Skinner knocked his hand away with a gentle motion, his large fingers probing along Mac's jaw for any damage. Mac submitted to the exam, wondering if the electric ripples of energy he felt inside could be felt along the surface of his skin. "That's a hell of an uppercut you've got." The pain diminished even as he moved his jaw to speak.

Brown eyes, oddly naked without glasses, shifted from his jaw to his eyes. Clouded and angry emotions, at odds with his gentle hands, darkened Skinner's gaze and his flat words. "I shouldn't be throwing punches at anyone in the mood I'm in."

MacLeod put his arm out and Skinner automatically took it, helping MacLeod to his feet. "If not here, where?" MacLeod laughed, peeling off his gloves. "Come on, Walter, I've taken far worse. It was my own damn fault for letting my guard down."

There was a pause as Skinner examined him further. "For purposely letting your guard down, you mean." Skinner turned and snatched a towel to wipe his face and neck, discarding his own head gear with a weary motion.

MacLeod sighed. So much for subtlety. "Yeah, well, you needed the outlet. It didn't do any harm."

"Not for lack of trying on my part." Skinner collected the equipment and began putting it away.

"Wait a minute," MacLeod shook his head, annoyed. "Don't try and hog all the responsibility for knocking me on my ass. Last time I looked, I'm a big boy who knows his own limits and can handle anything anyone dishes out."

Skinner finished placing the gloves on the shelf and shut the equipment door, ignoring Mac's protest. "If you point me to the showers, I'll wash up."

Skinner's steadfast attitude felt uncomfortably familiar to MacLeod. Frustration and humor mingled together, pushing pointed words to Mac's lips, but he sighed and dropped it without a fight. "Sure. Follow me." They went up the stairs, and MacLeod pointed out the gym showers, towels and other necessities. "Just ring for the elevator when you're done; I'll set the controls to on-call," MacLeod instructed and retreated upstairs to his own shower.

Hot water needled down with blissful force, soothing Mac's tired body. Dealing with Skinner's unexpected arrival had been enervating, more so than he'd realized. Leaving might have been easier; just taking off, buying a plane ticket to Paris then moving his operations back there for the next year or so, far away from the inquisitive arm of the FBI.

Instead, here he was, assuming responsibility for yet another injured stray. Maybe Methos was right, and he did have a crippling weakness for people struggling and in pain. Maybe it would one day become the death of him, as Methos had predicted; not a very pleasant prospect.

Then again, maybe it would become the death of Methos, too. MacLeod smirked as he thought of all the times the old man had interfered and rescued him from approaching disaster, risking his own neck in some way. So much for Methos' protestations of supreme indifference to everything not directly related to his own survival.

Survival and friendship. And love. Mac's thoughts turned to those nearest and dearest to him. His students. Richie. Lost loved ones. His father and mother, his clan. Lost lovers. Little Deer. Tessa. Best friends long gone or newly lost. Cullen. Fitz.

Fitz. He and Fitz had fumbled through consoling one another after Gina had married Robert deValicourt. Initially, it had been rather a shock for Mac. His reaction had made Fitz laugh and express his opinion to MacLeod with typical artless candor.

"MacLeod, you green boy, sex is a marvelous cathartic! Women may be my first love, but think. What better way for us to share our grief over losing the beauteous Gina? Besides which, you are none too lacking in looks, yourself! A prize for me, and you, you get to reap the benefits of the exquisite library of my boundless experience. All in all, a perfect arrangement, wouldn't you say, dear boy?"

Surprisingly enough, he'd been right. Fitz had always found a way to make Mac snap out of his doldrums and climb out of the melancholy that occasionally overtook him. He'd simply never honored this tendency of Mac's, refusing to allow MacLeod to withdraw in his usual way. Was that why he'd instinctively called Fitz after the fiasco with Anne? He'd needed to bury his grief from that situation somewhere, and there had been Fitz. But in Paris, he'd found a Fitz in love with the light of his life. And then Kalas had come calling, and Fitz had lost that light forever. And later, Mac had lost Fitz. No more could he turn to that irreverent face for refuge and relief, although it did seem as if Fitz was still enacting the implausible role of Mac's sanctuary, even if only in Mac's own fevered and stressed mind.

Fitz, an angel. A more unlikely role he'd yet seen cast. God help us all, MacLeod shook his head at the ironic humor, pulling himself back from the dark places in his mind.

MacLeod quit the shower, dried himself off briskly and donned jeans and shirt. As he pulled on a pair of thick socks, the past was bright in his mind. The joyous, undiminished love of life Fitz had expressed in everything he'd done had always shone through, and it finally occurred to MacLeod: what other quality should an angel have, if not that? Wasn't it the light of Fitz's simple joy that had cut through Mac's darkness time and again?

It was with a heart much more at ease and a mental image of a grinning Fitz with wings that MacLeod reheated the meal, set out dishes and made tea to accompany the simple fare. He would play out this scenario fate had thrown his way and do his best to help lighten Skinner's pain.

MacLeod liked him; his honesty and strength were compelling, and the straight-forward way he handled things was refreshing. In other circumstances...but no. It was what it was; he needed to just get on with things. Hopefully, by tomorrow, the FBI Director would be out of his life and things would get back to normal.

MacLeod settled down with a book, expecting the elevator to grind into gear at any moment. But the only sound he heard was the clock ticking, marking time's passage. After half an hour, MacLeod stood and headed downstairs to turn off the lights, certain that his unlikely guest had washed up and left. Relief eased Mac's tension; no need to deal with everything tonight.

*^*^*^*^*

Skinner heard approaching footsteps over the cascade of water. The hot water was long gone, leaving only the sluggish pressure of a cold drizzle pattering down and not quite missing him. His feet, numb and water-wrinkled, stood in a swirl of water circling relentlessly toward the drain in the middle of the floor. The bite of frozen nerves felt good, a distraction from everything else. He flexed his hands and moved his cheek against the slick, white expanse of tile.

"Walter? You okay?"

The man in charge of the FBI's entire Criminal Investigative Division breathed deeply and pushed himself away from the chilled surface. "Yeah, fine." He reached out and yanked the water control to off, stopping the icy flow before MacLeod could comment.

"I thought you had left."

Skinner heard the hesitation in MacLeod's words as he padded into the locker room. He took the towel MacLeod handed him and dried off his legs, trying to stifle the shaking that swept his chilled limbs. "No, no clothes," he shrugged.

MacLeod's beautiful eyes swept down his nude body, and Skinner felt a thawing heat beat lightly at the ice coating everything inside.

"You're freezing. Come back upstairs. There's clothes and food waiting." MacLeod smiled, his brown eyes crinkling.

Without a protest, Skinner found himself on the elevator, heading up. "You're determined to take care of me, aren't you," Skinner commented. "Why?"

MacLeod shrugged and looked away, an odd expression creasing his face. "I know what it's like to lose someone." He flung up the gate and crossed to his armoire, fishing out another pair of sweats. "Here, use these. Warm up."

The chill pervading his entire being fought a losing battle with the warmth from without.

Skinner automatically crossed to the bed and dropped the damp towel where he stood. Ignoring his lack of briefs, he pulled on the sweats one leg at a time, his muscles stiff from the icy water. Straightening up, he saw MacLeod standing by the armoire, watching.

Skinner caught him looking, and MacLeod shifted uncomfortably but held out the socks in his hand, his eyes straying down again, chin gesturing. "Looks like it was bad."

The scars on his gut and lower down. Skinner nodded once, and grabbed the sweatshirt. "Vietnam. And the FBI." The heavy fleece enveloped him with soft warmth, and then he sat on the edge of the bed, pulling socks on over his frozen feet.

MacLeod looked uncertain, hovering. "A close friend was in Vietnam. Joe, the owner of Joe's.. He lost his legs."

Skinner looked up, his gaze bleak. "Then he was lucky...he came home. My whole platoon didn't."

"Except for you."

Skinner stood up. "They had me in a body bag like all the others. Somehow, somebody checked again and found a pulse, I guess, I don't know. I didn't wake up until two weeks later."

"Then you were lucky, too."

"Was I?" Skinner let it drop there, his words echoing in the large room.

MacLeod frowned, and headed for the kitchen. "Come and sit. Eat. Would you like a beer or something hot to warm you up?"

The younger man hovered over him subtly throughout dinner. The understated solicitousness MacLeod displayed unsettled him. Skinner had been wrapped in ice for so long, and Mac's concern warmed him. He could feel the heat in his blood setting things back into motion again. Things ignored or forgotten began to stir inside, a confusing and overwhelming awakening.

After dinner, Skinner stood at the windows and looked up into the night sky. He wished he could push the chaos in himself away and become as empty as the vacuum of space; endless, deep and dark.

As still and empty as he imagined Mulder to be.

Or, God forbid--that he hoped Mulder was, awful hope that it might be. Dark and soulless possibilities had haunted him for months, possibilities the nameless confederates of his nemesis, the smoking man, might even now be perpetrating. It wasn't beyond possibility, and given past situations, the probability was nauseatingly high. His stomach roiled at the thought.

He remembered what they'd done to Sharon, just to get to him. Killing was just another necessity on the schedule for these people. Experimentation, however, was the core of their work. Experimentation on unwilling subjects. He'd witnessed firsthand the tests perpetrated on the children and people of Payson, South Carolina.

And Scully. He remembered what they'd done to Scully.

What was stopping them from striking again?

Fear rose sharp and fast, and he bit back a curse. Skinner ignored Mac's sharp glance as he sighted on his cell phone. The only thing he cared about was dialing the numbers, waiting with total concentration as the connection clicked through. It rang three times, then someone picked up.

"Scully."

"Agent Scully." Her voice was warm and alive in his ear. Relief flooded through Skinner's blood like liquor, making him feel weak. He sat down hurriedly on the sofa and took a deep breath. "I...I just called to see how you were."

"I'm fine, sir. But I've been concerned about you. You left without any warning, and no one seemed to know where you'd gone."

Skinner smiled faintly. Only Scully could achieve that combination of worry and reproach in an otherwise calm voice. "I needed some time off, away from the office. I'm fine, Scully."

"Sir..." Skinner could hear her frown through the telephone line. "Forgive me, but you don't sound fine, you sound...worried. Where are you, if I may ask?"

Scully's predictable questioning calmed him further. "I'm fine, Scully." Fine, her own understood euphemism for "shitty, but surviving". "I'm...at a friend's home. I took a couple weeks off. I just--" Yeah, Walter, scare the shit out of her on top of everything else. "I wanted to make sure you were okay."

"I'm fine. I'm at home doing some paperwork."

He cleared the thickening from his throat. "Make sure the door's locked. You have my cell phone number. Call if--you need anything."

He could almost hear her digesting that. "I will, and the door's locked."

"Good. Goodnight." He clicked off before waiting to hear any more of her response, his sudden fear for her safety now feeling like nothing more than overreaction in his own head. But that was the problem: How could he know for sure?

After all, they'd kidnapped her before and nearly killed her. Now, they'd probably killed Mulder and taken his body, the bastards. Cleaning up after themselves, no doubt. Not wanting to leave any evidence of their tampering where it could be discovered.

"Everything okay?" MacLeod gently interjected. Shifting focus, Skinner realized that his host had finished up in the kitchen while he sat and worried.

"Yeah, fine," he grimaced. "Sorry, I should have offered to help." Skinner gestured vaguely toward the kitchen behind MacLeod.

"Oh, no," MacLeod shook his head and sat down in a comfortable-looking armchair. "No need. Everything's done." He leaned forward and placed two newly refilled drink glasses on the time-scarred wooden table. "Here."

Skinner acknowledged it with a sigh and a nod, reaching out to take it and slip into the amber depths. Great invention, self-medication, he thought as he eyed the glass. Although, he'd need a bit more to achieve the desired state of numbness he wanted.

"Walter."

MacLeod's gentle tone of voice alerted him; Skinner's body tensed as if to ward off a blow. He reluctantly raised his eyes to meet Mac's steady gaze.

"If there's anything else I can tell you, anything you want to know, I'll do my best to set your mind at ease." MacLeod was calm but resolute, as if he'd steeled himself to talk about the situation. No wonder, Skinner sighed. Given his earlier responses, MacLeod would probably rather forget he was ever involved in the whole mess.

Skinner's head began to throb as the day's tension peaked. He twisted the glass in his hands, then stilled. "You don't owe me anything. You've already done much more than necessary."

MacLeod frowned, a finger running back and forth over the carved wood on the chair arm. "Agent Mulder was quite-eloquent with his words. He conveyed his concern for you very convincingly."

"There's no need for concern--"

"Why don't you let me be the judge of that. At the moment, you're not in any great shape."

Automatic denials reached the tip of Skinner's tongue, held back only by the irrefutable truth of MacLeod's words. His stomach burned to match his pounding head. "I should go..."

"Where? How? Our cars are still at Joe's. It's late, you've been drinking, and you'd have to call a cab tonight, and then get your car tomorrow morning." MacLeod stood and went to a storage closet, rummaging around in its depths. "Here." He emerged with a pillow and quilt in hand. "I won't even bother offering you the bed, since I know you'd refuse it. But do you think you can stand to take the sofa?" A wry look matched his tone. "Console yourself with the knowledge it's leather, and not the softest thing in the world."

Despite his aching head, Skinner cracked a crooked smile. "I'd have a few blistering words to say to a subordinate who got himself into a situation like this."

MacLeod shrugged. "Nobody around to yell at you, one of the perks of your job. Anyway, you seem to have managed well living and working in...unusual situations for some time now."

The smile melted off Skinner's face. "I never thought..." He didn't finish his sentence, and the silence settled into stillness in the loft.

MacLeod turned to use the bathroom, leaving his unexpected guest on the sofa. Even though it wasn't terribly late, Skinner was tired; it had been a long, exhausting day. Maybe he should stay, given the amount of alcohol he'd consumed.

He shivered; his ice wouldn't last long in the face of MacLeod's concern.

The thought scared him, but not enough to move his limbs. Skinner stayed exactly where he was.

Snapping off the light, MacLeod emerged into the main loft. Wrapped in his thick robe, he spoke softly. "Want anything else? Another drink? Something hot?"

Skinner stirred slowly, turning his head to look over his shoulder at MacLeod. "No. But thanks. It's--I'm--" Words failed, and he gave up on the attempt to find them.

MacLeod reached out a firm hand, placing it on Skinner's shoulder. "No problem. Help yourself to what you need in the bathroom. I'm going to sleep. It's been a long day."

Skinner nodded in abstract acknowledgement. Very long. The main lights in the loft clicked off, leaving the loft shrouded in long and deep shadows cast by lights outside the windows. Fabric whispered, covers rustled, and silence settled again. Skinner reached out and pulled the quilt up over his slowly chilling body, lying back against the pillow placed against the arm. He knew he wouldn't be able to sleep; the memories were too thick. But his body ached with exhaustion and needed the rest. He succumbed to reliving scenes of what once was; vestiges of contentment that existed no more.

*^*^*^*^*^*

Mac's dreams were surprisingly uneasy, filled with dread, guilt and gloom, and capped with an aching sense of loneliness. A steady stream of people kept passing before him. They seemed to be speaking to him, but he couldn't hear their words. Bloodless lips moved silently, while wounded eyes stared sightlessly into his own. Little Deer, Richie, Tessa, Charlie, Cullen, Fitz, Methos...he tried to connect with each of them, with no success. They kept moving away from him, looking like the walking dead. Gasping a silent cry, he came awake with a start, his hand curling reflexively around the sword at the head of his bed.

A large figure loomed over him in the darkness, and he stiffened, readying for action.

"You're awake. You were talking in your sleep," Skinner's voice was deep, sleep-rough.

MacLeod breathed out heavily with relief, sluicing tension from his limbs. "Bad dream," he murmured, releasing his grip on the sword. Adrenaline kept flooding into his bloodstream, though, making him feel hyper-alert. He breathed deeply in an effort to dissipate the energy.

"I wasn't sleeping well, either." The larger man shifted on his feet, close to the edge of the bed. "Too many...thoughts."

MacLeod felt the impact of Skinner's husky voice rumbling inside; his deep rumble bounced and quivered along Mac's hypersensitive nerves. Shivering, he stared up.

Faint lights from the street outside cast shadowed stripes of illumination across the floor, across MacLeod's bed and over Skinner's tall form. Skinner's face was in shadow, a vague outline in the dark. A strip of illumination fell across his chest, lighting his naked skin to a pale gray and the mat of chest hair to a swath of charcoal.

"I can't turn off my mind," the rumble continued.

MacLeod thought of the uneasy dreams that had left him restless and knew how Skinner felt. Wrapping himself around another body was the only thing Mac had found chased away his night monsters. Feeling another heartbeat, escaping his own mind in passion.

Having another person in his bed.

MacLeod blinked the last of his dreams away, sudden awareness skidding into place with a startling, belated slide of heat.

The charged silence lengthened uncomfortably, and still Skinner hesitated in the dark, mute and motionless with unexpressed need.

Mac shook his head, protesting his own sudden, rampant growth of electric perception. His nerves twitched. It's a colossally bad idea, his mind warned.

MacLeod ignored the voice. "Walter." He shivered, surprised by his own sudden need. What had been hiding in his own depths? The despairing loneliness he'd known in his dream haunted him around the edges.

Skinner paused, waiting.

Slowly, MacLeod pulled the bedcovers back. Cold air swirled onto the sheets. "How about a distraction."

After a brief pause, the bed dipped as Skinner sat on the edge. MacLeod's bare leg cozied up to warm skin. An image of Skinner naked, muscles glistening with water as he'd appeared earlier, large and powerful and very much alive, was clear in MacLeod's mind.

MacLeod pushed aside caution and sense as his heart rate sped up. He needed...something. And Skinner seemed to need this. He remembered Fitz and all the times he'd rescued Mac from his dark and lonely thoughts. It wasn't disaster in the making, he reassured himself. Skinner needed this. "Distraction can be...good," he added in a husky voice.

A large, undemanding hand clasped Mac's leg, thumb stroking in a slow, achingly deliberate upward slide. The higher Skinner's hand slid, the easier it was for Mac to ignore his cautioning voice.

Distraction was suddenly very good.

The density of darkness in the room increased with Skinner's firm touch. MacLeod dragged in a ragged breath of air. His cock swelled also, thickening and filling as the heat of that large hand moved closer. When Skinner encountered his briefs, unerring fingers ran the boundary between cotton and thigh, slipping underneath to graze over tender skin.

A slip of air hissed past Mac's lips as unexpected heat shot through him. He wanted, he really needed this, and he was completely ambushed by his own reaction. Folly, folly, folly, his mind whispered. Too many secrets...

Fisted hands grasped his briefs. MacLeod lifted his hips without thought as Skinner pulled white cotton down and over his legs. The briefs ended up tangled in a luminous pile on the comforter, an explicit punctuation in the otherwise dark, obscured text of the scene.

Naked, Mac strained to see Skinner's expression. Uncertainty stretched like a thin, tight cord between them.

A very ill-conceived idea, MacLeod thought once more. He reached out despite himself and tangled his fingers in the thick pelt of hair on Skinner's chest, feeling the firm wall of muscle under his hand, the fast, strong beat of Skinner's heart reverberating from within. The cord of tension seemed to snap in the air between them, coalescing into a different kind of energy.

Skinner's hesitancy dissolved. The bed trembled as Skinner shifted, his heat and bulk a warm comfort sliding down next to Mac. Hard muscles and male musk flooded Mac's senses, a distinctive combination invoking memories of friendship and comfort. It felt right, and MacLeod soaked it in.

Then Skinner pushed MacLeod down against the twisted sheets. Legs and arms tangled, and Mac ended up splayed wide, his limbs restrained by unyielding pressure. His cock pulsed with each heartbeat, trapped between the heat of their bodies. Skinner flexed his hips, rubbing his own hardening length against Mac's hip as his hands circled Mac's wrists.

Skinner's hitching breath was loud in Mac's ear, his mouth hot against it. "It seems so long..." Skinner seemed hesitant, fumbling for words, even though his body showed no hesitation or uncertainty. "May I?"

Skinner words were a gentle request, but his actions told Mac with an emphatic insistence that he was going to deliver what Skinner needed. The sharp and unusual sensation of being gently overpowered tore through Mac with barbed claws.

He turned his head until he saw the faint gleam of Skinner's eyes in the near-blackness. He didn't need to see details to know emotions were carving lines around Skinner's mouth and eyes; tension vibrated in Skinner's body.

Without pulling his hands away, Mac leaned up and found Skinner's mouth with his own in an aggressive move. "Take whatever you need," he murmured against Skinner's whisker-rough skin. His words surprised even him, but Mac meant them and felt heat burst through him at his own capitulation.

Skinner blanketed Mac, a solid wall of heat and muscle. Pinned and held and plundered, Mac couldn't think of any reason why this wasn't a good idea. Skinner's sharp, electric need banished the dark ache of loneliness that lingered with the remnants of his dream. The more Skinner took from Mac, the more Mac opened himself to the taking, and he felt his own buried kernel of guilt begin to lessen. He'd helped take something from this man. Maybe the scales could be brought more into balance.

And if under cover of darkness, under the guise of a debt owed, his own restless ache might be assuaged also, then MacLeod wouldn't complain.

Skinner's touch was firm and sure, scattering MacLeod's thoughts in the rush of sensation sweeping him. Releasing his wrists, Skinner moved against Mac, their trapped cocks sliding roughly against one another as they shifted.

MacLeod watched the sting of Skinner's teeth and nails mark a sharp, fleeting scintillation of light down his unblemished body. Darkness hid any of his blossoming bruises and their transient nature, while a faint golden glimmer sparked in the dark, adding to the unreality of the moment. Skinner continued to nip Mac's skin, sharp, pointed, sucking bites, making no comment about the very unusual electricity appearing between them. It was something that just was, part and parcel of the moment, electric and regenerative.

Skinner's raw, edged desire utterly subjugated MacLeod. As Skinner's fingers tightened and his teeth closed sharply on tender skin, MacLeod didn't protest. The sensation pierced through Mac's confusion, lancing in deeply and releasing a further flood of unseen need. He cried out, bucking up into Skinner's mouth, begging wordlessly for more of the same. It continued to shock him, this need that sparked bright and hot. Skinner paused, his brown eyes meeting Duncan's, each now wide and black.

What Mac saw reflected in Skinner's eyes reinforced his hunger. This time, when Skinner moved, there was even less gentleness in his touch. Skinner rolled MacLeod over onto his stomach, pushing his body around like a rag doll, and Mac acquiesced completely. He drank in the sensation of being covered by Skinner's body, a large, hot wall of hard flesh. Connection, a real live connection. Fingers tangled in his hair, pushing his face down into the pillow. He turned his face to the side, allowing air into his heaving lungs.

MacLeod's hair fanned out, and Skinner buried his face in the black mass. Strands caught on his whiskered cheeks. The tender skin under MacLeod's ear ached with quickly fading purple marks in the wake of Skinner's mouth.

Skinner's gruff voice rumbled in MacLeod's ear, one word that riveted his attention.

"Protection."

Mac fumbled to think with a sluggish brain and gave a negative shake of his head. "I'm clean, you?" he rasped.

Skinner paused, then grunted, his mouth pressed against Mac's ear. "I guess we'll do this skin to skin." His breath was hot against Mac's face, smelling faintly of the whisky he'd drunk earlier.

The heat in Mac's blood skyrocketed, fueled by Skinner's words. He pressed his hips against the bed, rubbing his aching cock against the damp cotton.

"Not yet," Skinner rumbled against the back of MacLeod's neck. "Up on your knees," he urged.

Mac dragged himself up, vulnerable and open and utterly silent. The scrape of Skinner's hair and legs against his skin sent shudders through him. A hand smoothed up his spine, and he arched into it like a cat; fingers curled in and nails grazed lightly on the trip back down. Two hands flattened on his skin, smoothing down his back and down further to cup his ass. Mac pressed back, and Skinner leaned forward, his mouth tracing the same path his hands had taken.

The pungent tang of male musk perfumed the bed. MacLeod breathed in deeply, aroused by the smell. He wanted to turn over, immerse himself in the other man's taste and scent, but Skinner held him immobile with his larger body. When Skinner searched and pulled his cheeks apart, MacLeod sagged even more deeply into the pillows cradling his head and shoulders, wanting more. A wet tongue touched him, and he jumped. Skinner spread him wider and flicked a tongue against him with wet swipes. Blood surged and his cock swelled; he moaned aloud. It had been too long since he'd had this, too long.

Mac's wordless sounds came in rhythm with long scrapes of rough tongue against his tender skin. Short, delicate flicks made him squirm; pointed probes had him panting, thrusting back for more. The rimming was as devastating as any torture, reducing him to moans of helplessness. Irretrievably broken, he was unable to do anything now but beg for mercy.

He'd buried it well, this need he had. He couldn't rouse himself to protest a thing, wanting whatever Skinner chose to do. Wanting the hard, heavy weight of muscle and strength against him. Wanting to surrender to Skinner's need.

Wanting, with all his knowledge, for Skinner to fuck him blind and senseless.

MacLeod moaned, a jagged, needy sound. It had been nearly century since the last time; had his need been this sharp, his delight in the idea this intense? He couldn't remember, could only know what he felt like now, with this man, in this crazy, insane situation.

Skinner shifted, and the pleasure stopped. MacLeod began to protest, but Skinner was there, his ragged voice betraying the edge to which he'd also been driven.

"Where's the lube," Skinner growled against him, a sound felt as much as heard.

The gruff words didn't fully register through Mac's lustful haze.

"Mac," Skinner pushed his hips into Mac, waking Mac up to the immediacy of his request.

"Drawer," he gestured with his left hand, "top right side."

Skinner stretched over MacLeod, pushing him down into the mattress as he reached for the drawer. Wood scraped; plastic creaked. The bed shifted again as he moved back from the edge, and Mac gathered his knees once more under himself, breathing deeply to clear away the fog.

Skinner moved closely between his legs, hair prickling against MacLeod's exposed skin. Softly stabbing fingers bled the last of any reluctance away, leaving MacLeod lax and ready. Skinner pressed a large, slippery cock against him, and his muscles tensed automatically against the intrusion. Thumbs skimmed pleasurably over his skin, stretched taut around the head of Skinner's insistent cock. Skinner pushed forward, sliding inexorably in. A slick massage by Skinner's nimble fingers soothed away the brief flare of pain.

Skinner paused as MacLeod adjusted to him, muscles giving way and bodies shifting into the embrace. His hips tilted, and Skinner pulled out slightly and pushed in deeper. The rounded pressure of Skinner's balls pressed against MacLeod, warm and firm.

"God," Mac whispered, groaning, "yeah... more, again."

MacLeod felt impaled, stretched to the limit, the nerves of his body exposed on the surface by the push and pull of their bodies together. Skinner angled down, and MacLeod cried out as Skinner's cock slid deep inside to the hilt. Pulling nearly out, Skinner slammed back in, skin making a wet, slapping sound as he pounded against MacLeod's ass. MacLeod gasped for breath, sensation spiraling faster than he could control.

Skinner surged into MacLeod's body, increasing the pace. Mac's cock throbbed from lack of attention with each drag and thrust. "Yeah... now..." he groaned.

He cried out with loud relief when Skinner inched a hand around to grasp his neglected cock in a firm, slick grip. MacLeod pushed hard into Skinner's fist, pulling out and impaling himself further, moaning and setting off a backwash of physical ecstasy coursing through him. They settled into a rough flow, rhythmic and primal, Skinner's hand fisted around MacLeod as his other hand dug deeply into his left hip, guiding and urging Mac to move faster or slower.

Pleasure sizzled along MacLeod's nerves like a Quickening. A mixture of exquisite pleasure and pain spiked, drawing moans from him with every move. Its intensity expanded in him until it merged into a single core of nearly violent energy, alive and singing and white-hot, until it boiled up his spine and along his limbs. He cried out, pleasure vibrating through his hips and cock, blinding him as he came, spurting onto his stomach. Skinner exploded into him in orgasm with a hoarse cry of victory, nearly pounding him into the sheets from the force of his final thrusts, strong hands keeping him from falling.

Everything hummed inside MacLeod, touch, sound and smell all clamoring for attention. A dazzling intensity hazed through him, halting thought. It faded away gradually into a white mist, and Mac retreated into its warm, bright environs, emptied and content and exhausted to his bones, inordinately glad of the silence.

*^*^*^*^*^*

Skinner slept like the dead. When he did gradually awaken, it took him long moments to reorient himself: bed, warm body, loft-MacLeod's. His brain functioned like so much mush, and he seemed more enervated than drinking alone would normally have left him.

A sex hangover, he thought wryly.

He didn't move, but slowly gathered his awareness into a cohesive whole and took stock.

Mac lay face down, sprawled amid the pillows. Skinner lay draped around him like a blanket. Thankfully, Skinner had gotten up last night for wet towels and wiped off both of them. Warm, clean skin pulsed under Skinner's hands and molded against his chest and legs. His hand burrowed into the soft fur of MacLeod's chest, and the steady rhythm of MacLeod's heart beat against his fingers. The crinkle of hair scraped against his wrist as he dragged his hand down a muscled chest and stomach. Hard, no give here, but warm, almost hot; alive and radiating a heat that rivaled his own. Under the sheets, it was almost roasting. The two of them generated enough heat that they'd kicked off the top covers sometime during the night.

The scent of the other man filled Skinner's nose; a virtual stranger, he realized, as he buried his face in the soft skin of Mac's neck where the downy hairs tickled his face. A cocoon of sensation cloaked him, surrounding him with the warmth of the living, the scent of life, of sex. All his many missing things were filled in here; the touches he'd missed, the feeling of another next to him. Skinner wanted to stay here and not move, not think, not wake up the sleeping giant that lurked inside him. He wanted only to enjoy the illusion of normality.

The man in his arms moved slightly, random shiftings of the sleeping, and snuffled a bit, air wheezing through sleep-lax passages. It was such a small thing, so simple, so....alive. An ache radiated through Skinner's chest, spearing down into his gut. He curled up tightly around the body in his arms, as if to absorb it into himself to mitigate the pain, but to no avail. This was not the body he wanted it to be. When the sleeping man awakened and spoke, it wouldn't be the lazy and drawling voice Skinner had awakened to for the past three years.

It forced something from him, acid that squeezed itself out of his eyes despite his wishes and burned against his face. It soaked into the dark layers of MacLeod's hair, hair in which he buried his face more deeply, hiding from reality. With his eyes closed, he could imagine the impossible...

When MacLeod stirred and awoke, the illusion Skinner had created disintegrated. With naked eyes, he stared at the man he clung to for comfort. A life-long need to hide his weaknesses beat at him, and he closed his eyes away from discovery, but too late. A rough-edged hand swept up his back, over his head and rested on the side of his face. His stubble snagged MacLeod's callused skin, making a soft zfftt, then a single thumb smeared the trail of wet on his face.

MacLeod kept his thumb there, rubbing back and forth in a gentle, mesmerizing gesture. Skinner stayed motionless, not looking, not responding in any way. If he acknowledged MacLeod's action, then he'd have to feel his own response, and if he felt his own response--

He shuddered against his wishes as the warm exhale of MacLeod's breath caressed his face. A shifting, a movement, then resonant determination battered at his flimsy walls.

"I think it's my turn now."

Skinner's eyes flew open. He found in MacLeod's eyes a warmth and a lambent sense of tranquility that both steadied him and left him closer to his own abyss than ever. "For what?" His throat constricted, thick and tight with feeling; he tried to swallow.

"For whatever I want." MacLeod laughed quietly and settled more firmly against Skinner. When Skinner didn't respond and shielded his eyes, Mac's grin faded to a more serious note as he briefly contemplated Skinner's tense mouth. "Right now, I think we could both use a shower. But first, good morning."

Without waiting for a response, MacLeod cupped a hand behind Skinner's head and leaned in. His kiss was firm and powerful, yet without any hint of force. It was a kiss of equals, one man to another.

By the time their kiss had ended, Skinner had gratefully regained a sense of control over his wayward emotions. "A shower sounds good, yeah."

"Then up and at 'em." MacLeod rolled over and stood up, sticking a hand back out. "Come on, we'll do this together. I've got plenty of room."

Skinner followed MacLeod automatically, caught up in the matter-of-fact attitude MacLeod used. He relaxed, his unruly feelings pushed back for the moment. Stretching as walked to the bathroom, he unraveled the kinks that had settled in overnight.

"Come on in when you're ready." MacLeod grinned with devilish appeal and disappeared around the wall of glass bricks used to separate the large tiled shower enclosure from the rest of the room.

Skinner quickly used the toilet and followed MacLeod around the translucent divider. Two shower heads rained down hot water, hot enough to steam up the space.

Skinner stood under one spout and soaked in the heat with an appreciative grunt. "These muscles and joints aren't as young as they used to be."

"They feel just fine to me." From behind, Mac reached around to splay his hands against Skinner's stomach.

"Trust me," Skinner spoke with an ironic edge. "I can feel the difference."

"You're as young as you feel."

Mac's blithe humor pushed Skinner's buttons. "There's your answer, then. I'm nearly fifty. I'm now twice a widower, and twice almost, but not quite, a father. When I was nineteen, I lost my whole unit in 'Nam. My parents died within a year of each other. People keep dying around me while I go on. Sometimes I feel like an ugly piece of granite, old and gray, and the storms are slowly wearing me away."

MacLeod ached at the sound of pain in Walter's harsh voice. In his brief half-century, Walter had lived with loss that reminded MacLeod of his own. Both lives had been filled with lost companions and lost dreams. If he were another Immortal, MacLeod could more easily dismiss it with the thought that Walter had many tomorrows for his dreams. But what could he say to this man, whose life was more than half over, who would never again know the same vigor of his youth? What was there to say? Words and reason eluded him, and only empathy pushed him on.

"None of us are unmarred, Walter. Each of us bears the marks of our experiences, whether they show or not. Sometimes the worst scars are invisible. Sometimes, all we can do is shed tears for our losses and take comfort, from wherever it comes."

MacLeod turned Walter around to face him. "Now it's my turn. Let me give some to you." MacLeod slowly traced fingers over the lines grief and pain had etched into Walter's face, seeing the need in Walter's eyes he couldn't express. "Have y' not, Walter, in all this time, taken respite from your burdens?"

The answer was clear in the way Skinner avoided Mac's searching gaze.

MacLeod sighed. "It's not easy, is it, for us to admit that we're hurting, or that we're in pain. That a part of us is broken and we fear it never to be repaired. My...my Tessa, and Fitz, both dead before they should have been. And another, who was like a son to me..." MacLeod broke off, grief rising to the surface in an instant, even after all this time. "The Buddhists' first great Truth is that all life is suffering. You're no different from any other man, Walter, wandering through life, trying to find meaning in it and a bit of contentment."

Skinner took a shuddering breath, trying to hold back the ache that arose at Mac's words. He clutched at MacLeod, hard hands with a hard grip, and MacLeod returned the embrace. Mac could feel the tremors passing through the larger man, waves of grief and pain radiating out from deep inside that turned suddenly into silent and tearless gasps which wracked his whole body in a noiseless, eerie purging.

MacLeod held on through Skinner's storm, letting him know he was not alone. A strong man, normally so insular, MacLeod thought. He stroked Skinner's shoulders, down his arms, felt the tension in Skinner's clenched fists, all the while thankful that he'd had Fitz and others to hold him through at least some of his own dark times. He remembered the emptiness when he'd not had the comfort of someone's embrace in dark times, the barrenness and desolation. MacLeod thanked God he had known friends and lovers who had helped push the darkness back when it had threatened to consume him.

When Skinner was still again, Mac picked up the sponge and soap and proceeded to wash him from head to toe. They stayed silent; the sound of the water hitting the tiles made a soothing background. Mac pushed and prodded the larger man's body, quiescent now in MacLeod's hands. Mac then washed himself quickly, rinsing suds from his hair in the cooling water.

"C'mon," MacLeod urged Skinner from the enclosure. "Even my water heater has its limits."

They shivered slightly even in the steamed air of the bathroom; MacLeod cursed because he'd forgotten to turn up the thermostat earlier. He pulled down oversized towels from the closet to wrap around themselves, and more to dry themselves with. A soft swipe of terrycloth brushed down his back while he was rubbing his hair dry.

"Let me," Skinner repeated MacLeod's words of earlier. He took the towel from Mac's hands and began to rub Mac's hair. "Beautiful hair," he murmured. Silence, then, barely heard, "The past months have been a nightmare...thank you."

When MacLeod's hair lay in drying waves around his ears, he grasped Skinner's hand and walked out of the bathroom, stopping by the unmade bed. He gazed at Skinner, from his long legs to the soft, graying hair on his chest to the top of his naked head, then twitched the towel away from his compact hips.

"I told you this morning's all mine."

Sometime in the night, MacLeod had made peace with his guilt demons. Now he wanted to remove the bruised look Skinner had in and around his eyes, the wounds and weariness that marked him. MacLeod recognized Walter Skinner as the kind of man who bore everything in silence and continued on with his life, leaving the surface of his wounds only scabbed over, while they festered underneath. Life should be about more than simply continuing to breathe, and MacLeod wanted to make sure Walter understood it.

For a man who only the night before seemed driven in his pursuit of their mutual forgetfulness, this morning Skinner was strangely passive. MacLeod rolled him onto his stomach, tracing the lines of muscle cording his broad shoulders and back, muscle that bunched and knotted with long-held tension. The stressed muscles of a person who routinely carried too much.

For a moment, MacLeod looked through a mirror and saw himself. Saw his own tendencies to shoulder responsibility and to suffer. And realized that from the time Skinner had sat in his office, it'd been inevitable. How could he have turned away a reflection of himself?

As much as MacLeod had accepted last night, he gave back this morning. They moved in an understated ballet, silent and slow in the revealing sunlight of day, the opposite of fast and furious in the dark of midnight. MacLeod traced mouth and hands over sun-browned shoulders, down the indentation of Skinner's spine, and along pale hips; a slow, sensuous seduction that coaxed low groans from deep in Skinner's chest.

Skinner surprised him by moving silently to his knees, but took his offering with the same slow, inexorable pace he took everything else. MacLeod couldn't resist running his tongue over the hard, muscular cheeks presented to him, tracing muscle, concave dimples and moving down into the crease to ready Skinner. Grasping with firm fingers, MacLeod pushed his cock in between taut cheeks into the tight heat waiting, and gasped hard as his control nearly went up in flames. All his focus narrowed down to mere inches of his body, inches buried in the firmest grip he could imagine. Heat and pressure coaxed the last of his control away from him. MacLeod fought for restraint as he pulsed slowly into Skinner's body. He only succeeded as a single, muffled noise from the pillows sifted through the pleasure.

Leaning forward, but not stopping his slow undulation, he wrapped warm arms around Skinner and nosed into the fringe on the back of Skinner's head. "Okay?" he whispered.

Skinner nodded. "Yeah," he replied, his voice hoarse and unsteady.

MacLeod shifted and trailed his mouth over Skinner's tense neck and down his spine, peppering kisses wherever he could reach. He heard another stifled sound and a muffled "Please," and shifted to free an arm. Reaching around, he wrapped his fingers around Skinner's cock. It was semi-erect, and MacLeod slowly coaxed it into full hardness.

If last night had been inspired by their darkness, this morning was a celebration of light. To MacLeod, each slide into Skinner's body seemed like he was undressing him, a relentless exposure, bit by bit, of Skinner's darkness to the light. Each stroke of MacLeod's hand pulled the darkness further up and out. With each push and pull, Mac was stripping Skinner bare, his near-silent, raw responses sounding louder and more intense.

The light gathered, an unyielding corona pressing inward and outward, persistent, until it swamped him with its power. Skinner cried out, a grief-edged acknowledgment of his inevitable pleasure, draining himself even as he was filled. MacLeod gasped and stiffened as he came, and an uprush of something undefinable moved through him and out, leaving in its wake a sense of peace and stillness nestling in their bed.

A strange, silent calm embraced MacLeod. The slowing pulse of blood beat a resonant tattoo where his skin connected to Skinner's. A good silence stretched out, not fraught with uncomfortable tension.

Skinner turned slowly and kissed him, a gentle meshing of lips and mouth. Wordless, Skinner stared at MacLeod, his eyes full of unspoken things. Still silent, then he walked to the bathroom.

With a sigh, MacLeod slid from the rumpled sheets also, his thoughts about starting breakfast interspersed with wistful images of him dragging Skinner back to bed for the rest of the day. Unfortunately-no. He'd pushed his luck enough. Time to move on, for both of them. Wasn't that what he'd hoped to accomplish to begin with? Get Skinner to move on and begin to live again.

Move along, moving on. God knows, he had done it many times before.

They dressed, moved around the loft and ate, all in that same companionable, tranquil silence. It was as if all the sharp edges had been filed down, all their jagged lines erased. All the darkness lurking in the corners had been released into the mitigating qualities of the light. MacLeod didn't question it; such moments were fleeting, even in his long life.

When breakfast clean-up was done, MacLeod threw the towel onto the kitchen counter. Skinner stood in the middle of the loft, lost in thought.

"We'll need to get our cars," MacLeod reminded him.

Skinner nodded. "MacLeod," he began, watching MacLeod shrug into his coat. "Mac. Thank you. For..." Skinner looked like a man who had no words to express himself.

MacLeod's mouth curled up. A wicked imp spurred him to reply, "It was my pleasure."

Skinner flushed a faint pink from the look MacLeod gave him as he shrugged into his own suit jacket and overcoat. They trundled onto the elevator for the ride downstairs. Halfway down, Skinner leaned in close behind MacLeod.

"Yeah, your loud and noisy pleasure was never in doubt." When MacLeod turned a surprised face toward him, Skinner reached a hand up to steady Mac's face for a kiss. They jostled apart as the noisy mechanism jerked to a halt.

When MacLeod threw open the doors, he was laughing softly. Skinner wore an inscrutable expression, but the laughter in his eyes gave him away.

They walked through the dojo, just beginning to fill with clients doing morning workouts. MacLeod greeted a young woman, muscular from weight training, and introduced her to Skinner as his assistant manager. Skinner nodded, and she returned to spotting the person on the weight bench as the two men continued out through the front door.

It was a brisk day, a weak sunlight not doing much to warm the cold wind coming in off the Pacific and sweeping through the city. Both men fell into step, hands in their pockets as they walked the blocks back to Joe's lot.

MacLeod wondered why he hadn't heard from Joe yet, expecting the Watcher to check up on him to make sure everything was okay since he'd left his car at the bar. He made a mental note to stop by and say hi to his Watcher friend later on.

As they walked, the silence was companionable and easy.

Skinner's voice brought MacLeod back from his reverie. "You had a message for Scully, too."

He nodded slowly. "Yes, yes I do."

"Should I have her call you later today so you can deliver it in person?" Skinner studiously avoided MacLeod's eyes.

"You can, or I can write it down for you to give to her. Whatever you think is best."

Skinner kept walking, then finally met MacLeod's eyes. "I think Scully would...appreciate hearing it directly from you. Despite my own original reaction."

"That's fine, Walter. I'll be at the dojo all afternoon." MacLeod stopped, and laid an impulsive hand on Skinner's arm. "Why don't you meet me later on for dinner? Joe's got a small group that plays live at eight o'clock, quiet stuff, instrumental blues and jazz. That is, if you're up for it," MacLeod added.

The corners of Skinner's mouth drew down for a moment, a brief shadow passing through his eyes before they cleared. "Sure, why not. I doubt anything more important will crop up today." They walked along for a minute. "It was ridiculous to fly out here. I don't have a clue what I expected to find."

"Wait a minute." MacLeod put out an arm and stopped Skinner. "I don't think it was silly. I don't know what you'd hoped to find, but I hope you found something."

"I--"The evenness of MacLeod's gaze made Skinner's voice husky. "Yeah, I found something. Not what I had planned on, though."

"Well, then," MacLeod squeezed Walter's arm and started walking again, needing nothing more than that to settle matters.

They walked another fifteen minutes down streets coming alive with morning traffic as commuters rushed to work. Arriving at Joe's lot, both cars sat undisturbed where they'd left them the day before.

MacLeod smiled. "See you here later."

"Wait." Skinner shuffled through his pockets for his business card and a pen, writing on the back. "Here's my cell phone number, in case you need to contact me. Thanks, MacLeod. For everything."

Guilt fueled by Skinner's last words passed over MacLeod's face for a split second, followed by a smile. "You, too, Walter." Too quickly for Skinner to protest, MacLeod reached out and cupped a hand on his shoulder, leaned in and kissed him. He trailed a thumb from the edge of Skinner's mouth down to his chin. "See you this evening."

MacLeod watched the rented Taurus pull out of the lot into the steady morning traffic, then turned and walked to his own car. A restless energy flowed through him, and the thought of facing paperwork back at the dojo was not appealing. Maybe a run in the park would be good, down along the seawall. Work off some of this energy. Help calm the annoying feeling of unquiet in his soul.

Methos could be right about my destructive streak, MacLeod thought. Thoughts of the old man complicated the already confusing mess inside of him. MacLeod let his head fall back against the headrest. Someday, he wanted to figure out what to do about that situation. Soon, he sighed. But, not today.

The old T-bird started without a hitch, and MacLeod merged out into the passing traffic.

*^*^*^*^*^*

Washington, D.C.  
November, 2000

"Sir, excuse me, but there's a visitor downstairs requesting permission to see you. His name is Duncan MacLeod."

Skinner stared at his assistant, taken completely by surprise.

"I can tell security to refuse him, if you'd like," Kim mistook his silence for annoyance.

"No! No, tell them to let him up. We'll be done here in a few minutes."

Kim nodded and closed the door again.

Skinner motioned for the reporting agent to continue, then immediately lost the thread of what the agent was saying. The emotional events of a year ago loomed suddenly, uncomfortably, close. Sometimes, it seemed a lifetime ago and a world away, but not always. Sometimes, alone in his apartment in the dead of night, the memories were so thick, their taste and scent nearly drove him mad.

It had been a long, insular year.

Skinner vaguely registered Daniels wrapping up his report. Slowly, he pushed his chair away from the conference table and stood. "I want to commend everyone here on the professionalism with which this case was handled. Justice is celebrating over what we managed to gather as evidence. They're confident that Detrick and his men are going away for a long time." A small babble of excited voices arose. "That's it, Agents."

Skinner shook the hands of three of the task force's young agents, agents he himself had handpicked for this assignment because of their intelligence and savvy professionalism. Glowing, fresh faces beamed at him, and Skinner had to excuse himself, shutting himself away behind his bathroom door.

A mirrored wall reflected his features back to him in the unkind florescent light. What would Duncan MacLeod see after all this time? A tired, middle-aged man. He felt even older than he looked. He'd only been going through the motions this past year, yet garnering one success after another under his belt. Ironically, he could suddenly do no wrong. He was the golden-haired boy, long past the time the epithet might have fit.

There'd been no upheavals in his division; even the X Files had continued on with new agents assigned to its domain. They were yet another fresh-faced pair. No expense reports for wrecked cars or missing cell phones had crossed his desk, and their reports were sedate and legible. Skinner found them perversely boring. He wondered if the scent of cigarette smoke ever hung in the air in that basement office, but even in light of the truths he knew, Skinner couldn't find it in his heart to care. No one had bothered him all year long. He'd been left to do his job-and grieve-in peace. And he wondered if they thought he was broken, now that Mulder was no longer alive.

There was probably more truth to that sentiment than not.

This past year had been hard, not being able to grieve openly. Hearing the occasional comments from others in the Hoover about Mulder's death and his body's disappearance, and having to hide his pain. At odd moments, he'd thought of Seacouver and MacLeod, and the solace he'd found there. Those memories of grief acknowledged had seen him through wearing the lies of indifference along with his Brooks Brothers suit through the endless days.

Scully had transferred to Quantico many months back, her star rising there much faster than it had before. Skinner didn't blame her for leaving the X Files and was glad for her, and secretly did what he could to assist in her success. They had met for lunch occasionally, even for dinner a few times on weekends. But that, too, was bittersweet, and he doled out those moments for himself sparingly, afraid to burden the younger woman with what he considered his dolorous, gruff presence. She was young, her life still full, with much ahead of her. She didn't need to nursemaid him through his loss.

Which left him here. Going through another day, filled with rote paperwork, rote meetings, rote congratulations for those doing well, rote chastisement for those who'd screwed up.

And the letter of congratulations from the President of the United States concerning the Philadelphia Electronics case, with its international implications, that had sat on his desk for the past two weeks.

Freeh had handed it to Skinner during a regular meeting, mentioning that they were starting to think ahead to the end of the Director's ten-year term in another 18 months. Skinner's name had been discussed after he'd attended a briefing in the Oval Office about the PE Corp case. And if Skinner kept up the brilliant work his division had been producing this past year, he might find himself with a new office view.

Back in the saddle again. Back with the program. Back to the upward climb.

Oh, how the lowly have risen. Or, at least some of us, he amended silently. He washed his face to sluice away the stale feeling before going back in his office to face the sharp eyes of Duncan MacLeod. A wry smile lightened his face. He had a feeling that MacLeod would see right through any hardy bullshit he could manufacture.

The prospect of not having to wear his mask was oddly invigorating.

Kim buzzed him in a minute. "Mr. MacLeod is here, sir."

"Send him in, Kim."

The man who walked through Skinner's door was just as warm and attractive as Skinner remembered.

"Walter, good to see you," MacLeod smiled and stuck out a hand.

Skinner took it with a strong grip. "Duncan MacLeod. This is certainly a surprise." He eyed MacLeod's expensive Italian suit and shoes. "I'm not sure I would have recognized you on the street," he kidded. "You clean up well."

MacLeod laughed. "I had some business to conduct in the area. Had to pull out my power clothes. It fits right in with this corner office."

"I'm just a cop, a glorified paper pusher and bureaucrat. Very little cachet here." Skinner gestured toward the couch. "Have a seat. What business?"

MacLeod unbuttoned his suit coat and sat back. "I own 51 percent of a company in Northern Virginia, a communications company. They had their annual Board of Directors meeting."

"Still have the dojo?"

"Yes, it's still there." MacLeod gave him a long look. "But how about you, Walter? How have you been?"

Skinner stood and took a few paces. "Here. Doing my job, and quite well, if the results are any indication." At MacLeod's raised brows, Skinner gave into a sudden, irrational urge to discuss his latest news. "They informed me I'm on the short list for nomination for Director when Freeh's term is up."

"Really? Congratulations, Walter. That's quite an achievement."

"You don't know the half of it," Skinner said with irony, thinking of all the unpopular decisions he'd stood by when Mulder was with the X Files. "It would certainly be a vindication of my efforts," he added slowly.

MacLeod stood up. "What are you thinking, Walter?"

Skinner didn't answer directly, but sat down on the edge of his desk. "You're the first person in two weeks I've said anything to about this."

MacLeod raised his eyebrows, waiting. Skinner looked thoughtfully at him. "It's getting late in the day. How about I blow off the rest of the afternoon. We can catch a drink, some dinner."

Regret and a slight awkwardness subtly shifted MacLeod's expression. "I'd like that, Walter, if you don't mind someone else joining us."

The disappointment flooding through Skinner took him by surprise. Embarrassed, he walked to the windows, hands on his hips. "I misunderstood," he said, appalled at his assumption. "When I heard you were here...."

MacLeod stood and went over to stand silently by Skinner. He pulled back the curtains and looked down on Pennsylvania Avenue.

Skinner knew the scene: the snow stood piled in plowed mounds, with more flurries skittering through the leaden, winter sky. The winter season had started out unkind in D.C. this year. Already, it was bleak and cold and miserable. Somehow, he'd felt strangely comforted by the leaden skies; nature seemed to share in Skinner's despondency.

"Walter, tell me. How have you really been this past year?"

MacLeod's question echoed in the room, a room in which Skinner had hidden himself, buried alive in work for the past ten months. The mask he wore every day, which had seemed strong and substantial, disintegrated under Mac's eyes. "I've... it's been hard," he murmured, gazing sightlessly at the snow. "It was a year two months ago," he added without preamble.

A hand landed on his shoulder. "Please, come to dinner with me, with us."

Skinner shifted dubious eyes to MacLeod.

"Adam won't mind. I think you'd enjoy meeting him." A smile lurked around MacLeod's mouth.

It was probably a testimony to how lonely he really was, Skinner thought. Eagerness leapt up in him at the thought of spending time with MacLeod, even if a third person sat between them. It was the lure of moments spent without the necessity of lying or hiding who he was and what he felt that had Skinner ignoring prudence and saying yes. He didn't care about MacLeod's relationship; he wanted only to enjoy the luxury of someone to talk freely to about his life. A strange desire for a taciturn man, but it was the eyes, MacLeod's depthless brown eyes, that Skinner couldn't resist. Those eyes by-passed what others saw when they looked at him and went right inside.

He sighed, and smiled faintly. "Okay. Where and when?"

MacLeod squeezed the hand on Skinner's shoulder. "We're staying at the Hay-Adams. How about dinner at The Lafayette? I had the concierge book a table, just in case."

"Business must be very good in that company." Skinner shook his head. "I'll gladly let you buy me dinner tonight."

"Good." MacLeod squeezed his hand, then backed away and rebuttoned his suit coat. "Meet us for drinks in the bar first, about 7:30?"

Skinner agreed, and saw MacLeod out before shutting his door again.

It was a big weakness, Skinner knew, his need to be known. But just one more time, Skinner promised himself. Just this once. Then he'd let the job reabsorb him, let it continue the process his wife hadn't been able to stop. Only one person had made it stop...and he was gone, so what did it matter? Let work take over his mind and body; at least it filled the empty spaces.

*^*^*^*^*

The Hay-Adams Hotel  
2:30 a.m.  
Despite being wide awake and unable to sleep, MacLeod relaxed from relief; dinner and drinks had gone well. The empty, unlit look in Walter's eyes, which unsettled Mac at the beginning, had been replaced with a mild sparkle of wit and humor by the end of the evening. It might not have been what Walter had expected when Mac had shown up at his office, but it damn well seemed like it was something he'd needed. Mac could relay his positive observations to Jon Petursson in Iceland, and hopefully, it would help settle his restless, resident nuisance of a student. Skinner was doing fine. Really, better than fine; his career was moving upward on a fast track.

He sighed, and moved restlessly in the dark. The clock on the bedside table glowed a steady 2:37 a.m. in neon red.

"Something on your mind?" A deep-throated murmur stirred the air near his ear. Adam Pierson, a.k.a. Methos, the world's oldest living Immortal, curled himself more closely around Mac's body. "Or maybe it's just the damn chill in this room that's keeping you awake."

MacLeod snorted. "It's at least 72 degrees in this five-star hotel suite, hardly cold. It's just your skinny bones rattling around in your thin skin, without enough layers of muscle to protect them from normal winter weather."

"I didn't hear you complaining earlier about my skinny bones, Mac. You seemed rather enamored with them, actually. And as far as layers go, isn't that why I have you, the human furnace, in my bed?"

MacLeod rolled over and trapped Methos beneath him. "If you say so. I thought it was for the non-complaining I was doing earlier."

They shifted and settled into their new positions, and MacLeod began to doze off once more.

"This evening appeased your conscience, didn't it."

MacLeod only grunted in response, not wanting to talk about it. " 'M sleepin'."

Methos ignored him. "You believed him, didn't you."

MacLeod sighed, annoyed. "Methos, I'd like to go to sleep."

"You're going to call Petursson and say you checked him out, and he's doing fine. His career is soaring, after all."

Annoyance started to blur into anger, dissipating his sleepiness. "And what's wrong with that?"

MacLeod felt more than heard Methos' smug chuckle. "Not a thing--"

"Well, then--"

"--if it were true."

Dammit. MacLeod rolled back over and pushed away, dangling his legs over the side of the bed. "What's with your sudden role as ethics advisor, in the middle of the night, no less?" He hopped up, slid a bathrobe over his nakedness and strode more by sense than sight into the main room of the suite.

He'd poured a tumbler full of whisky by the time Methos rambled out into the living room, wrapping himself in a white hotel bathrobe.

"It took me a while, but I figured it out tonight."

"Figured out what?" MacLeod sat down by the window, looking out over the numerous city lights.

"I couldn't figure out why you were so disturbed about lying to this mortal. Why you felt such guilt over sending a new Immortal away. Not that you overdosing on guilt is a new thing, but--"

"What the hell are you talking about, Methos? I never said--"

"Oh, please, give it a rest, Duncan. After five thousand years, I've gotten pretty good at reading people. Especially the ones I'm sleeping with."

Methos curled his fingers into MacLeod's tousled hair, and Mac jerked away, slanting a narrow-eyed look at the older Immortal. "Methos..."

"You slept with him."

"What?" That got MacLeod's attention.

"His hard-edged integrity seduced you, didn't it. Although, I suppose his legs and arse and those dangerous eyes helped. Nothing less would have you doubting your actions so much."

"Jesus, Methos." MacLeod didn't know whether to shout in outrage or let out the laughter that threatened.

"I know you, Duncan. There's nothing more sacred to you than those Immortal rules you live by, and it would take something hitting very close to home to have you twisting on a rope and questioning your actions." Methos eased himself down on the wide arm of MacLeod's chair. "So, what are you going to do?"

"I'm not--" MacLeod stopped, grimaced and sighed. "I don't know," he admitted. The silence beat on for a few minutes before he whispered, "Do y'think I'd be a fool for telling him?"

"Telling Skinner his lover still lives?" Methos shrugged. "He's used to dealing in secrets, I'd wager; the shadows are in his eyes. If you're asking me if I think he'd be a good risk, yes, why not?" Methos cocked an eyebrow at MacLeod. "However, I don't know if he'd forgive you for your deception."

"I'm sure that irony amuses you." MacLeod let his head fall back against the chair. "It's really not a main concern. Walter...it was circumstantial. We both needed something at the time. As for now, I don't want to raise his expectations and then find out he can't deal with it. Better the dead should stay 'dead', in that case."

"While I claim being a good judge of character, I've yet to develop the fool-proof ability to predict the future." Methos began playing with MacLeod's hair again. This time, MacLeod didn't pull away. "You're going to have to make a decision based on your own knowledge of the man, Mac."

MacLeod only sighed.

"C'mon, let's go back to bed. I need all the beauty sleep I can get at my age."

MacLeod agreed, feeling suddenly weary. He crawled into bed and tangled his legs around Methos' wiry ones, wriggling into a comfortable position. Skinner's oddly defenseless brown eyes were vivid in his mind. Those eyes followed him into sleep, naked brown eyes staring at him, silently reproaching him for his lies, and his dreams were full of sorrow.

*^*^*^*^*^*

Reykjavik, Iceland  
One week later

At times, Skinner truly regretted the need to behave with a certain level of decorum because of his position. Standing in the doorway of his office the other day, Skinner had watched Mac's retreating figure and shook with a suppressed need to chase MacLeod down the hallway, drag him back to his office by brute force, cuff him to the conference table and refuse to let him budge until the man coughed up some answers.

It would probably have taken the Deputy Director all of about five minutes to be knocking on his door, demanding entrance; the old Hoover scuttlebutt machine was efficient and fast. That had been the only thing that kept his desire leashed in.

Damn MacLeod, anyway. How dare he hand out a round trip airplane ticket to Iceland, of all the damn places, without any explanations or answers, other than an itinerary and an address, and an admonition that something important awaited him there. Should he believe the stupefied and blank look MacLeod had given him when he'd slammed Mac down in a chair and nearly spit with anger as he accused MacLeod of working for the Consortium?

Mac wouldn't offer any other explanation, and it was all Skinner could come up with--what else could MacLeod be if not a participant? Why else send him on a trip to the edge of the world?

Despite his lack of answers, or maybe because of them, he had taken that pre-arranged flight to Kennedy and transferred onto the Icelandic Air flight to Reykjavik.

Iceland in the winter months was not on the main tourist route. In the airplane magazine Skinner read, the writer had flippantly described how, after September, the country pretty much rolled up shop and went into hibernation. But then again, she also had said the gulf stream kept the southern coastline, where Reykjavik was located, livable and comparably temperate, so it could be worse.

He had no idea what to expect. He kept wanting to look for the handy travel brief Kim always prepared for him when he traveled to unfamiliar places, but all he had was an itinerary and the address MacLeod had handed him. That and a churning stomach and bleary eyes from a restless flight. It was now 6:30 a.m. in Reykjavik, but in D.C., it was 1:30 in the morning. Even though he'd stretched out in his luxurious first-class seat on the large Boeing 757--lots of money in Consortium business--the five and a half hour flight from Kennedy had not been comfortable.

He wished he'd forced MacLeod to give him more information; he worried about what he was blindly heading into. He imagined confronting MacLeod, and this time, getting the answers he wanted. But it was too late now.

He was here, nearly at the end of his journey.

The airport and car rental staff all spoke English, thankfully, and within a reasonable amount of time, Skinner was sitting in the front of a dark red jeep, again courtesy of MacLeod.

He'd forgotten he was in the land of the midnight sun. But it was winter now, so it was the land of just plain midnight, eternal darkness until the sun once again raised its head above the edge of the horizon in the spring. He was glad of his warm clothing, his woolen hat and waterproof gloves. It might be temperate here compared to the northern edge of the country, but it was still damn cold.

Turning on the overhead light, Skinner checked his route on the map again. The rental agent had kindly marked it for him, showing him the roads to the Grand Hotel Reykjavik where his reservation awaited, and also to Laufasvegur 72, the address in the envelope. He would go to the hotel, check in, change clothes and eat, then search out the mysterious address.

His well-intentioned plan died a quick death, aborted before he put it into action. The address burned a hole in his pocket, demanding immediate reconnaissance; his curiosity demanded satisfaction. From his luggage, he unearthed his SIG Sauer P226 9mm semi-automatic, fished out a 15 round clip and shoved it in with sharp movements. He may have come half-way around the world without back-up, but he'd be damned if he'd go in without his gun.

The roads he followed took him out of thickly populated areas into a section of large properties and houses. Slowing to peer at addresses on mailboxes, Skinner saw he'd finally turned onto the Laufasvegur road. From what he could see in the dark, it wound down around a curvy shoreline on his left, the houses all to his right.

Number 72 shown clearly on a mailbox at the end of a drive to a large house, modern in style, sitting back from the road a bit on a slight, rocky promontory. No trees broke the landscape; Iceland was, for the most part, a land of barren, craggy topography.

Skinner stopped, backed up, and pulled over on the side of the road with his headlights off. It was only scant minutes before eight o'clock in the morning. The best course of action would be to wait and watch, see if someone appeared.

Two cars passed him, heading back into the city proper, probably commuters heading off to work. The realization gave him pause-it was a normal day for other people, filled with the known and familiar. As for himself, even after hours of speculation, he had no real idea what his day would bring.

Then he noticed something else: the darkness had lifted. Not by much, not enough to call it something other than dark. But the blackness in which he had arrived had changed to a soft, hazy, charcoal gray.

Skinner could see clearly at a small distance now. He saw the guardrail on the other side of the road that protected cars from a drop down to the waterline. Seabirds sat on the rail, flying up and swooping down in an early morning feeding ritual.

Huddling in his down jacket, Skinner sat watching the birds and occasionally glancing at the house to check for activity. Other than the birds and a lone runner far up the road, nothing else moved in this desolate place. No cars passed him again, no people appeared at the handful of houses nearby.

He wondered who would live here, and he thought that he liked it, liked the stark peacefulness of it. It was a long way from Washington. Anonymity and little interference; a lot could be gotten away with this far from everyone.

Time ticked by, and the running figure became more than a speck as he gained proximity in the darkness. Wrapped in heavy fleece against the weather with a hood up over his head, the runner came straight down the road at a good clip and stopped fifty feet in front of Skinner. Right at the base of the driveway to Laufasvegur 72.

Skinner's body reacted before his mind. Adrenaline flooded his bloodstream; his heart rate increased. His hand flexed automatically on the grip of his SIG.

His mind kicked in a mere second after his instinctive response. Words, a jumbled mass of thoughts, burst through his mind. He took a deep breath and pushed the mental uproar aside, focusing on the only important thing: the rangy body half-buried in fleece.

The shadowed hood faced his way for a moment as the runner casually checked out the Jeep. But then, just as casually, he dismissed it, and the runner went back to his cool-down routine, bending and stretching and swinging his long arms around.

The darkness continued to lift fractionally. A pale glow now pushed against the darkness on the southeastern horizon. The runner walked over to the guardrail and leaned against it, flipping the fleece hood back and staring down onto the rocky shore below.

Close-cropped hair molded the back of a fine head and neck. Skinner's heart, which had slowed down at the lack of threat, sped up once again, this time in a different tattoo. The runner's profile, though indistinct in the gray light, looked painfully familiar. Then the runner turned and stared straight at the Jeep again as he continued stretching.

Skinner's breathing stopped as time slowed to a crawl. Odd fragments of things flashed through his mind.

//...I wonder if they'll extend my leave and my visa....Sister Mary Katherine was right all those years ago...//

Skinner blinked; the runner twisted at the waist and stretched, then turned and placed one foot up on the guardrail to stretch hamstrings.

//...I have to call Scully, she's the one with the faith. She needs to know...//

The runner placed the other foot on the guardrail and leaned forward again. A whisper of doubt from remembered conversations crept into Skinner's mind.

//....What if he's not real, what if he bleeds green?//

As Skinner climbed from the jeep, the man turned his way while he twisted and stretched, continuing his cool-down. Then he suddenly stilled, and his foot fell from its perch on the guardrail. He took a jerky step toward Skinner and stopped.

Skinner swore the sun came up when the runner's eyes opened wide and a crooked grin creased his face; everything took on a golden cast.

They walked to each other with identical expressions of stunned disbelief on their faces. The cold silence stretched out as they stood drinking in the reality of each other. Skinner could feel the other man's body heat, could smell the unique fragrance that he'd come to know so well over the years: sweat, excitement, fear and soap combining into a mixture that brought the emotion he'd been holding back surging to the surface.

He was real...he had to be real. No one could fake that unique, precious smell.

"Walter." With that one word, strong arms wrapped him inside that fragrance and heat, another heartbeat pounding like a drum against his own chest.

As he held on with a painful, joyous grip, his heart rate climbed so fast that his head began to spin. He shut his eyes and buried his face in the familiar, dear slide of silken hair. Only one coherent thought solidified in his mind, a fact gleaned from the Iceland tourist information he'd read on the plane.

Only one mammal was indigenous to Icelandic soil.

The arctic fox.

-=the end=-

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For other Wounded Heroes stories, see the links at:  
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